Friends forging a course together through the unexpected

The Knot kindly reminded me this week that there are less than 120 days until I get hitched. However, it wasn’t the Knot reminder email that made it seem like the big day is getting closer. Instead it was another wedding! The last wedding that I’ll stand up in 2013 until my own.

The weekend was a blast. Friday night kicked off the wedding weekend with a manicure and pedicure date at Hannah’s Nail Salon. They were very friendly and allowed us to bring in a few beverages to enjoy. The bride gave us our first present too, the nail color for the wedding. It’s a beautiful magenta color that matched the wedding accent color perfectly. Saturday included the run-down at the church followed by the rehearsal dinner at Giordanos. Once again we had a great time getting to meet the rest of the bridal party and swap bride and groom stories. Plus the bride gave the bridesmaids more goodies (as did the groom to the groomsmen). But we received earrings for the wedding that were hand-made by the bride’s aunt, a wooden hanger for our dresses, a freezable wine glass and a lunch bag with our name embroidered. Oh, and a sweet hand-written letter from the bride. So now we were all set for the main event on Sunday.

The girls were up early to be at the hotel for hair and make up by 9:30AM. Luckily, I made a Starbucks run which gave the perfect pick-me up to all the bridesmaids. It was a lot of fun to watch the hair and make-up transformations in the morning. From lots of teasing to troll hair to smooth and sleek and ready for the dance floor. Our timing throughout the day was perfect as well as the vendors. We were all dressed and ready to go by our assigned time with our flowers.

Bridesmaid Flowers

We made it to the church in an awesome party bus for the ceremony to start right on time. The ceremony was beautiful. It was a little longer than the typical Protestant wedding I’m used to, but I made it through the full Catholic mass without a problem. Luckily for the bridesmaids, we got to sit down in between the long parts!

After the ceremony we were off for pictures. We stayed in the church for a few formal pictures but then we were off to a local park. We took a ton of fun pictures that I cannot wait to see. We even managed to beat the rain and make it to cocktail hour with plenty of time for a drink and appetizers.

The reception couldn’t have gone better. Every detail was accounted for – from the favors, the table centerpieces of a single rose and the up lighting around the room. Plus the food was amazing. I mean, any wedding that has two desserts gets an A+ in my book. And the DJ, he just kept rockin’ it so you felt bad when you left the dance floor to get water.

The bride and groom definitely set the bar high for Matt and I to follow. Matt even commented a day later that he would “totally do-over that wedding and go back in time and do it all again”. Guess we gotta get to work because we’re not competitive or anything 🙂

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This weekend I was Jill’s date for wedding in Milwaukee. Jill came in late Friday night. We simply put TLC on TV, watched all the bridal shows and pretty much fell asleep on the couch. The next morning we got up and met up with our friend Sonya for brunch. Originally our plan was to meet at Wildberry, but unfortunately there was a 45-minute wait which we didn’t have time for. Luckily there was a Panera just down the road. Once we were fueled up we hit the road.

The drive north was quite pleasant. I was very apprehensive when we reached the Wisconsin state line and only saw traffic cones. It was a sea of construction blinkers. Luckily the traffic was light and we were able to coast through to Milwaukee.

We got in and immediately checked in at our hotel, Aloft. The hotel was very nice and Jill got a good deal on the room. We had forty-five minutes to spare before the ceremony started. Plenty of time to get ready and double check our directions to the church. A five minute drive later, we were seated in a beautiful Unitarian church enjoying a nice ceremony. After the ceremony we went back to the hotel for a quick shoe change and met up with a few of Jill’s friends at a bar. Being in Wisconsin, I had one goal for the night – to drink a New Glarus beer. And the bar had Spotted Cow on tap. Woohoo! We had a great time catching up before heading over to Lakefront Brewery for the reception.

Cocktail hour opened with lots of tasty appetizers. A table was lined with a fruit tray, cheese tray, shrimp fountain, bread and delicious meatballs. For dinner I had the beef which was served with mashed potatoes and green beans. The beef was amazing! The cake was chocolate with raspberry. Somehow Jill managed to snag three pieces. Don’t ask me how she does it. So naturally we had to dance a lot to make room for the late night snacks – a full on build your own nachos or grab a hot pretzel bar. I bet you can guess what we did next…yep, more dancing.

Sunday morning we woke up and checked out early to start the drive back. I definitely want to go back to Milwaukee. The prices were reasonable and I saw a few more breweries that need exploring.

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To give my elbow a break from ranting this week, how about some wedding updates?

Last time I checked in with you it was to inform you of all the craft making for my best friend, Jill’s wedding, and when I said yes to my dress. We’ve made quite a bit of progress since then.

What have we done?

Selected our ceremony site

Selected our reception venue

Booked a photographer

Choose our wedding colors

Finalized budget

Pretty much finalized our guest list

Choose our attendants

Selected components of our centerpieces

Took our engagement photos with Redwall Photography – check them out! I’ve got one example for you below as a teaser.

Engagement Shot courtesy of Redwall Photography

On the horizon

Choosing a DJ

Selecting a hair/make-up artist

Securing lodging (finalizing this week)

Choosing flowers (hopefully in two weeks)

Selecting bridesmaid dresses (getting some ideas this weekend!)

Creating our “brand” for the wedding

We’re making great progress. We’re setting goals and achieving them realistically within our budget. I’m glad we’re getting a lot of the major components out of the way now to avoid potential wrinkles down the line, because we all know how things can come up at the last minute!

Going through the process with Matt has also been really fun. We’ve had great conversations about what we want and what we definitely do not want. Having his involvement has been wonderful. He keeps things light and funny, from not knowing “branding” was necessary for a wedding to getting just as stoked as myself about our potential centerpieces.

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One of the greatest things I read in preparation for my recent nuptials was an article interviewing Brides on their big “Do’s” and “Don’ts” that they reflected on after their big day. As they say, hindsight is always 20/20, so I was glad I took a step ahead and attempt to learn from these other brides so I wouldn’t make the same mistakes at my own wedding (September 2, 2012)!

Because my dear friend Karla is planning her big day for next year, and because I found the article so helpful, I thought I would post my own list of “Do’s” and “Don’ts” that I learned on September 2, 2012.

(1) Do – Sorround yourself with people who will make you feel relaxed and comfortable when you are getting ready. There were a ton of people who wanted to be there while we prepped for the big day, but I really do better with small groups of people who could help me take my mind off of being nervous. This was CRUCIAL in keeping me relaxed and happy while getting ready.

(2) Don’t – be in a rush to remove your veil. I was all prepped to have my dress bustled and my veil removed at the reception, but after reading this piece of advice from a friend, I was so glad that I found a way to bustle my veil and left it on for the first part of our reception. Remember, this is the one day you get to wear a veil and be a bride… enjoy it!

(3) Do – spend the time to go around to all of your guests. I can’t stand when I go to weddings and I don’t get even a measley 30 seconds with the bride and groom. After all, I traveled to the event, bought a present and I consider you to be a good friend. This was a ton of work at our wedding (we had 200 people!) but one of the greatest compliments we received was how wonderful it was that we took the time to speak to everyone, even if for a few minutes. We especially were grateful we gave our guests the time when we saw how generous they were with their gifts!

(4) Don’t – be impatient with your photographer. Mine kept inching me around and telling me to move a little to the right or left and it took FOREVER to take pictures. I was getting so impatient until I remembered that I wanted the pictures to be beautiful – and guess what? They were! It’s totally worth it to let the photographer do their job and just smile and enjoy the moment.

(5) Don’t – be afraid to part from tradition on things that matter to you. For me, the venue was the most important, so I used fake flowers (they looked real, I swear!), printed our own invitations and my aunt helped with the centerpieces and set up of the aisle. For my bouquet, I did a brooch bouquet because I wanted something different and now it’s a keepsake!

(6) Don’t – forget to dance. I was so busy at my wedding that I had no time to eat, let alone get on the dance floor. I made it out there for a few numbers, but on the last slow song, I had several people tell me that they missed a chance to dance with the bride. Don’t be afraid to do a dollar-dance or some sort of event where you can dance with several people and give them your attention. I never did it and I wish I had.

(7) Do – trust your decisions. So many girls I know planning weddings can’t make up their minds because there are so many options and you want the day to be perfect. Once you make a decision about something, be confident that it will work out and be happy with the choices you made. In the end, the day is such a blur, you’re just happy to be a Mrs. to the man you love!

Hope this helps for anyone getting married… I know it was nice to see people’s feedback before I walked down the aisle myself. If anyone else has advice to share, I’d love to hear what you learned after your wedding!

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The past two weekends I’ve attended a couple weddings. I had three weddings to attend last August and was really excited to receive invitations to two weddings this October. I am going to be pretty sad when my friends get out of the wedding phase. It’s really a great expression of who a couple is. Have you ever noticed that the personality of the couple is reflected in the feeling of the wedding? I know there are people who do not like going to weddings. They ask, ‘Do I have to go to the church?’ Are you kidding me!? That’s the most important part! I swear to you I am not a girl whose sole dream in life is to get married. I have a degree, started a career that I love, and I do have a boyfriend, but I’m really in no hurry to walk down the aisle. That being said I may or may not have a document on my computer with all the wedding ideas I really love….

Seriously before you judge me just put yourself in my shoes. I crave details, I like to have a plan. Weddings contain so many details. Details that someday, I want to be perfect. There are the flowers, the vows, the dress, the cake, and the daddy/daughter dance…tons of details! I can’t possibly come up with all of those things in a traditional engagement time period. So I figure I can start taking notes now and by the time I do get married I’ll be prepared.